The pizza industry has grown very rapidly over the past two decades to become one of the leaders in the food service industry for carry-out orders or actual delivery to the customer's location. After cooking, the pizza is inserted into a paperboard container for pick-up by the customer at the store location or, in some cases, delivery to the customer's location. Such containers are fabricated from a single paperboard blank which includes a variety of fold lines to permit the blank to be folded into the final container configuration for holding the pizza in a secure manner for transport.
Prior art containers primarily consist of rectangular, octagonal and six-sided versions wherein the front corners of a normally rectangular shape are replaced by a diagonal corner wall. The rectangular shaped container has been the configuration most often used in the past, however, since most pizzas are made in a generally circular shape, there is a waste of corner space and consequent waste of paperboard material. This material waste has become a concern due to the tremendous competition in the pizza industry, particularly between large pizza chains which consume a high volume of paperboard pizza containers.
Therefore there has been considerable attention directed over the last several years to new paperboard container designs for the pizza industry which attempts to reduce the amount of paperboard material while maintaining the necessary strength required to securely carry a pizza. Additionally, it would be advantageous to incorporate a latch or releasable locking means to secure the lid portion of the container in the closed position in an economical manner which also makes erecting and closing the box easier for employees at the pizza store location.
Examples of prior art paperboard containers of the type referred to herein are found in the following U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,118,032; 5,110,039; 5,263,634; 4,809,908 and 5,211,329. While these prior paperboard containers are directed to improving the features of such boxes or reducing material costs, further improvement in these areas is a desirable and advantageous goal.